22 May 2013 8:29 PM

David Cameron's position on same-sex marriage is not a conservative one. It's a call for upheaval

Not many people read or hear
the Book of Common Prayer these days. Most of the clergy of the Church of
England give the impression of disliking it, some are viciously hostile, and
churchgoers have to hunt around for services that use it.

Comedians don’t
even make fun of it. You might have thought all that archaic language would
have been an easy target, but perhaps memories of the old church services have
all but died out, or perhaps something about them defies mockery.

Observe how
when Rowan Atkinson goes on Children in Need, he chooses to take the rise out
of the way modernising archbishops talk. He gets complaints for incorporating
modern sexual slang.

Political
leaders, even those who have had the benefit of an expensive education, give
the impression they are unfamiliar with Thomas Cranmer’s prayer book. This is a
pity, because the Book of Common Prayer, first published in 1549, was a
foundation stone of the emerging English nation and guided the institutions of
the country for centuries.

Its wording was,
for example, adopted by the Victorians for the non-religious civil marriage
ceremony. The old register office legal vows were altered by legislation less
than 20 years ago, at the prompting of a Roman Catholic Tory MP concerned
mainly about anti-Catholic discrimination.

So if you want to
get a grip on England’s historic understanding of the institution of marriage,
you could do worse than refer to the prayer book, which says ‘it was ordained for the procreation of children, to be
brought up in the fear and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise of his holy
Name.’

Pretty clear I think. What else?

‘Secondly, it was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid
fornication; that such persons as have not the gift of continency might marry,
and keep themselves undefiled members of Christ's body.’

Shades of Rowan Atkinson there. That may be why our clergy are
now so shy of the old prayer book. But you can’t misunderstand.

And?

‘Thirdly, it was ordained for the mutual society, help, and
comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and
adversity. Into which holy estate these two persons present come now to be
joined.’

You can argue with some effect that points two and three speak
in favour of same-sex marriage. Unfortunately, if you want to maintain that
same-sex marriage is in keeping with the finest British tradition and practice,
you have a problem with point one.

The more so since the BCP goes out of its way to insist the
marriage ceremony involves ‘this man and this woman’.

One further thing about the old prayer book. It has a quaint
old ‘table of kindred and affinity’, which lists at length the relatives people
may not marry, starting with their own children and stretching to son’s son’s
wife and daughter’s daughter’s husband. This is where 16th century religious
doctrine and practicality met.

The essential prayer book kith and kin rules still apply,
through the 1949 Marriage Act which remains the basis of marriage law.

So when Culture Secretary Maria Miller told the Commons during
the same-sex marriage debate that ‘people should not be excluded from marriage,
simply because of who they love’, she was saying something that departs
radically from previous understanding.

When she told MPs that the values of marriage are the values
upon which society is built, and ‘they must be values available to all,
underpinning an institution available to all couples,’ she was talking through
her hat.

When she told the Commons that marriage has evolved, that
evolution has been strictly limited. Easier divorce, yes. Weddings in stately
homes, yes. A public lifetime legal bond between a man and a woman? That only
began to change in October 2011, at the Tory Party conference, thanks to the
Prime Minister.

David Cameron spoke on BBC Radio Four’s Today Programme
following the debate. He said: 'I think marriage is a
wonderful institution, it helps people to commit to each other. I think it’s
such a good institution it should be available to gay people as well as
heterosexuals.’

This is not a conservative
position. It is a call for upheaval.

Mr Cameron and Mrs
Miller may well be right when they say that same-sex marriage is the right
thing to do, that it will spread the benefits of marriage, and that it brings
Britain in line with what is happening in the rest of the developed world.

The alarm felt by their
critics may well be misplaced.

But when Mr Cameron says
he supports gay marriage ‘because I’m a Conservative’, he needs to understand
why conservatives might decide they are no longer Conservatives.

@ Peter pie eater. The reason no one complains about childless heterosexual couples undermining marriage is obvious - it is because they do not.

The reason they do not undermine the traditions of marriage is because they are male and female....and therefore illustrate the traditions of marriage. Because 'Marriage' is between a man and a woman...and everyone knows this...the idea is not even slightly contentious.

What is being passed into law is not marriage as we have known it....it is something entirely new. Is that simple enough for you?

You missed the other main reason for marraige: Money. The marraige contract ensured that assets remained in the correct lineage, ie the legitimate eldest son. What we are moving towards is inheritance by the eldest child of the 'union' regardless of 'issue'. What we're witnessing is asset redistrubution, starting of course with the assets of the former CofE.

It is my belief that David Cameron has no personal position on same sex marriage, he is simply carrying out that which has been decreed by the ECHR. In March 2010 a meeting of the Coucil of Europe agred a recommendation to to oppose discrimination of persons on grounds of sexual orientation. Then the ECHR ruled in favour of Gay Marriage. Ergo D.Cameron is simply obeying the ECHR.

Traditional Marriage could have been left alone, but the Civil Partnership legislation should have been improved to remove its shortcomings and unfairnesses. Marriage has already been reduced to, 'let's try it for a bit and see if it works', and had already lost the power to make people try and make a stable lifelong commitment primarily for the well being of children, and for mutual support when elderly. Now the pressure is there to extend marriage to include various other bizarre arrangements, like 3 people, or sexless relationships between family members that would otherwise be illegal. I simply cannot understand those who argue that these changes and those that will follow will not make the original concept meaningless. Too late now, the specialness and respect have gone, few heterosexuals bother anymore and soon the majority of kids will be in one parent families and we will all be alone in old age. Looks like a pretty stupid societal plan to me.

Why some are so keen to promote dysfunctionality disguised as freedom I cannot explain either.

The foundation of sex is reproduction. This is where the sex differences, the sexes themselves, and the sex act, originate. The purpose of sexuality, coming out of that, is to provide attraction between men and women so that they procreate. This is the origin and core of sexuality, without which the very concept of the sexes (and thus also of “mother”, “father” and “family”) is made nonsensical and redundant (as they only exist as part of (hetero)sexual reproduction).

How can you have a marriage based on a sexuality that makes nonsensical and redundant the very concept of the sexes themselves (along with “mother”, “father” and “family”)?

Would you not also have a problem with point one if you are too old to have children, unable to conceive or simply do not want children? I haven't seen too many why-oh-why columns complaining that childless heterosexual couples are undermining the traditions of marriage.

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